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Dancing in the Santa Ana Winds: Poems y Cuentos New and Selected

In “Dancing in the Santa Ana Winds: Poems y Cuentos New and Selected,” liz gonzález explores memories, pivotal experiences, and cultural influences that shaped her: The death of a young father, family relationships that nurture and challenge, and the joys and struggles of growing up as a nontraditional Catholic Mexican American. Set against the diverse landscapes of the San Bernardino Valley and Los Angeles, these richly textured and sometimes humorous works, real and imagined, illuminate the trials and beauty of girls’ and women’s journeys to reclaim themselves.

Praise for “Dancing in the Santa Ana Winds”

“This collection of poetry and prose by liz gonzalez heralds another watermark in the enduring presence of a vital Southern California writer.”
– Ruth Nolan, author of “Ruby Mountain”

Overlaid with the rituals and imagery of the Catholic church and 70s rock, funk, and R&B bands pouring from car radios, the Inland Empire is alive with culture, sensation and the fullness of life.– Suzanne Lummis, author of “Open Twenty-Four Hours: Poems”

liz gonzález, MFA, grew up in the San Bernardino Valley. She is the author of “Dancing in the Santa Ana Winds: Poems y Cuentos New and Selected” (Los Nietos Press July 2018). Her poetry, fiction, or creative nonfiction have appeared in the “City of Los Angeles Latino Heritage Month Calendar and Cultural Guide,” “Inlandia: A Literary Journey,” “BorderSenses,” and “The San Francisco Chronicle” and has been widely anthologized. She is the author of the poetry collection “Beneath Bone” (Manifest Press 2000). Her awards include an Arts Council for Long Beach Professional Artist Fellowship, an Elizabeth George Foundation Artistic Grant, and residencies at Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, the Lucas Artists Residency Program, and Hedgebrook.

liz lives in Long Beach, California, with an indifferent chihuahua, a talkative tortie cat, and Jorge Martin, a scientist and musician. She directs Uptown Word & Arts and is an instructor for the UCLA Extension Writers Program.

Los Nietos Press is proud to announce Linda Singer’s new book of poems, “Wingless”.

Linda Singer is a Southern California poet who has been published in several poetry journals including Lummox, Incandescent Mind, Short Poems Ain’t Got Nobody to Love, The Moment, Manuscript, Addiction and Spring Harvest.

“Linda Singer poems persuade that all poems are love poems, either by inclusion or difference. Her poems of love lived, gathered, and survived, extract the sweetness of the water of life whether it be in the form of cruel ice or evasive vapor. While mapping the strange dances between angels and crows, she convinces that in passion, loss, and struggle, selfless ‘wingless’ love is the only true reward.”
— Gary Jacobelly, playwright and poet

“I’ve always admired Linda Singer and her ability to write about life as seen through thea eyes of experience. This collection is no exception. In it she tackles all the mortal sins, examines them carefully, makes an evaluation and moves on. There is no melodrama, no emoting, none of the pretense that is ever-present in modern poetry. She’s as refreshing as a cool drink of water!”
— RD Armstrong, poet & publisher (www.lummoxpress.com)

“Linda Singer is a story teller. She captures the reader with her ‘smoldering dreams/ of pleasure and sanction and consent.’ This is not a roses and violins book of love poems. It’s the bloody, giddy, real deal.”
— Elaine Mintzer, Natural Selections

“Pure theatre, these pieces are like torch songs in a smoky night club. Seductive and heartfelt, they purr like a cat, and then pounce. Singer has mastered the wry sense of humor that comes with self-knowledge. Vulnerable and honest, these poems reveal the longings of a sophisticated lady.”
— Lorine Parks, Persons of Interest

call: 562-928-9279

This second collection of poetry continues Trista Dominqu’s tour through the blue-collar working class Southern California that moves beneath the glitz of Hollywood, the money Santa Monica and the Chrome skyline of Downtown. In poems such as “So Cali”, “Working Class Blue” and “45 minutes of Spanglish” she explores the world of steel-toed shoes, tattooed forearms, skate parks and mills South East of the city epicenter.

This book is personal, matter-of-fact, and will reach your soul.

“In So Cali, Trista Dominqu tells us what it is really like to grow up in Southern California. It is a place where different cultures rub up against each other with their food, music, and language; where graffiti is art; where the beach is a long trolley ride away. A place where the most important thing is not the weather, is not surfing, is not Hollywood; it is family.”
– G. Murray Thomas, My Kidney Just Arrived

“Trista Dominqu’s collection, So Cali, reads like a family photo album … with childhood moments of trolley rides, anthills, avocados, pool dives, and June bugs. It zooms out to a working class neighborhood, with baseball caps and flannels, young mothers and gutter kids, local libraries and Spanish teachers, and sons with protective mothers. … You will close these pages with images so tangible, vibrant, and immediate, you will confuse them with memories of your own.”
-Sarah Thursday, All the Tiny Anchors

Dominqu’s first book, “The Beauty of Muttliness,” debuted in 2013 at Poetry Matters. She has also performed at such venues as the La Puente art walk, Poetry Palooza and the Green Salon. Her work has appeared in Full of Crow and Cadence Collective online poetry magazines, and multiple anthologies by Cadence Collective, Lummox Press and Lucid Moose Lit.

Los Nietos Press is proud to announce the publication of Persons of Interest, the latest collection of poetry by Lorine Parks.

Parks is a prolific writer who finds subject material in daily events and news stories. Although she studied classical literature, her first published book, Catalina Eddy, was fanciful personification of the many manifestations of Southern California weather in the form of a mafia family. For her latest collection she draws on her classical roots, but also from her many years as a professional travel consultant, to explore fascinating individuals throughout history, and to weave a woman’s perspective to this expansive cross section of life.

“Persons of Interest is a fascinating, chilling and remarkably clear-eyed navigation along the tightrope world that we all must walk.” –FRANK KEARNS

“Among these poems we get, as part of the bargain, the wonderful “Old Woman”series. Women of all ages will empathize. Women writers of all ages will be jealous they hadn’t thought of it first. I know I am.” – SUZANNE LUMMIS

Lorine Parks will be the featured reader at POETRY MATTERS, the monthly poetry reading that she curates at STAY GALLERY. Her reading will take place on February 19th. Doors open at 7:00, open mike begins at 7:30.

Downey poet and artist Rosalie Desimone Sciortino will be the featured reader for Poetry Matters, Thursday, January 15, at Stay Gallery. Her work over the years has had an impact on the Downey arts scene in many ways. Sciortino was a leader in Writers Workshop West (a writing group spearheaded by theater director John Hume), and a board member of the Downey Art League. She has often been a contributing writer to the Downey Patriot, and before that the Downey Eagle. Doors will open at 6:30 PM for a reception, and her artwork will be on display for a week.

Reflecting her wit and creativity, Sciortino’s new book, The Gift, includes a whimsical short story and several memoirs of her Downey childhood, in addition to her lyrical poetry. Her poems convey her love of nature and reflections on the human spirit. “Her gift is the transformation of the common to the uncommon,” writes poet Zaida Ramos.

Sciortino is a virtual native of Downey, having arrived here with her family when she was just twenty days old. Her parents, who met and married in Colorado after immigrating separately from Sicily, settled into a farmhouse with acreage at the corner of what is now Paramount and Florence where the Chase Bank sits.

At that time Paramount Blvd, known then as College, dead-ended at Florence, and vehicles were only able to turn east or west. Sciortnio recalls that loaded hay trucks would shake the timbers of the house as they rolled to a stop at the corner.

Sciortino was the youngest of seven siblings, with her neighborhood defined by orange groves, sooty air from smudge pots, irrigation ditches, and the “magical sylvan retreat” of the Rio San Gabriel river bed. Relatives from Los Angeles described their weekly visits to Downey as “a trip to the country.”

In the 1970’s Sciortino was an active member of the Downey Art League when the organization’s membership was at its height. She explored a variety of media, including oil, collage, and acrylic, winning numerous prizes. Her subjects range from stylized still-life’s to realistic figures and cityscapes.

While writing and painting were her chosen vehicles for expressing her love of nature and beauty, Sciortino’s creativity was not limited to these art forms. Fans of talk radio on KABC in the 1980’s remember Sciortino’s comedic call-in’s to the morning Ken and Bob Company show. Listeners were invited to win prizes by calling in with explanations and descriptions of common terms. Sciortino would call in so often that she would change her name, but she could not disguise her voice. She recalls that her husband’s golfing buddies would tell him, “Your wife’s on the radio again.”

As an avid KABC listener, Sciortino’s prize-winning success was legendary. She twice won tickets to an opening game of the Dodgers, several dinners at high-end restaurants in Beverly Hills, and tickets for the Cirque de Soleil when it premiered during the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984.

Sciortino’s impact on the Downey art scene extends beyond her own writing and painting. Sciortino has contributed years of community service as a member of the Downey Symphony Guild, helping with fund-raisers that support the regular season concerts and the Music in the Schools program. The music education program, started in 1995, serves 11,000 local elementary students in the area’s public and private schools.